Sermons on important subjects by Rev. Paul C. Jong

Have You
Become Light in the Gospel of Truth?

< Genesis 1:2-3 >

“The earth was without form, and void; and darkness
was on the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering
over the face of the waters. Then God said, ‘Let there be light’;
and there was light.”

By creating the universe and all creatures in it,
God revealed His great and majestic plan through Jesus Christ. Chapter
1 of the Book of Genesis shows us the majestic plan that God has
prepared for us mankind. In other words, the creation of the heavens
and the earth and of all creatures, the making of mankind in the
likeness of the image of God, the fall of mankind deceived by Satan,
salvation through Jesus Christ, our becoming God’s children in His
providence, and the blessings of the everlasting grace of God-all
these things are shown in this first chapter of Genesis.

That is why it is written, “In the beginning God
created the heavens and the earth,” and this is followed by,
“The earth was without form, and void; and darkness was on the
face of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face
of the waters” (Genesis 1:2). When it says here, “The earth
was without form, and void; and darkness was on the face of the
deep,” this implies the condition of mankind and all things created
by God that fell into confusion deceived by Satan, a fallen spiritual
creature. Put differently, it describes mankind’s fall into sin.

First of all, we must reach the proper understanding
of the will of God who created the universe and all creatures in
it. If we do not know God’s will, or, even worse, misunderstand
it, then we would be at a great risk. Everything under the heavens
has its existential purpose. When God made us, He essentially decided
to make us His children in Jesus Christ. Even before the foundation
of the world, in other words, God already had in His mind a plan
to make us His children and lift us up as divine beings.

That is why God made us according to His plan, allowed
us to face hardship while living on this earth, made us look for
Him through such difficulties, permitted us to find the gospel of
Truth that has blotted out our sins through Jesus Christ, and in
doing so, God made us His Children and gave us His beautiful Kingdom.
Like this, God has made us realize that nothing depends on our own
will, but everything has come by only His will. Therefore, as we
live in this world, feel and reflect on these things, we experience
for ourselves that what we want to do is not achieved according
to our own will, but according to how God had already predestined
originally; all that we do is enter into God’s domain by believing
in His Word and follow Him only by faith. That is why Jesus said,
“I am the Way” (John 14:6).

It is when we read the Bible that we can fully grasp
God’s plan. God had a plan for us mankind, and He has also shown
us His plan by manifesting it in the Word according to how He planned.
Therefore, it is in the Word of God that we can discover the will
of God, and it is by believing in this Word and following it that
we can find God. So when we believe in God, it is according to His
promised Word that we should know and believe in God.

If you are to think all on your own without giving
any heed to God’s Word of promises, decide all for yourselves and
try to find God all on your own, then from then on, you will only
fall into confusion. To find God, one must believe in His promised
Word and follow it; only then can we meet God. That is why God has
given us the Bible.

Without the Bible, the Word of God, it is impossible
for us to find God. The Bible is the Word of God. And it is the
Word of covenant, which God has fulfilled and will continue to fulfill.
The Bible writes that God is the God of the Word, who planned with
the Word, fulfilled this plan for us with the Word, and came to
us and met us through the Word.

The Word is God (John 1:1). God is the Word, and when
He manifests Himself before mankind, He does so through the Word
of promise. We should all clearly realize that God has already revealed
Himself through His Word, and that He is the God of promise who
meets us through this Word.

We must not read the Bible as if we were reading a
novel or a history book. Rather, we must realize and believe that
this Word itself is the Word of promise spoken by God. It is in
His Word that God reveals Himself to us. So whenever you and I read
the Bible, we should all first realize that it is the Word that
God promised to us.

The Bible Is the Light of
Salvation to Mankind

It is written, “The earth was without form, and
void; and darkness was on the face of the deep. And the Spirit of
God was hovering over the face of the waters. Then God said, ‘Let
there be light’; and there was light… God divided the light from
the darkness. God called the light Day, and the darkness He called
Night” (Genesis 1:2-5).

This passage here, where God called the light day
and the darkness night, contains God’s indomitable will to drive
out sin from the souls that are bound in it. It is saying that what
drives out this sin, all this confusion, void, and darkness, is
the light.

Who, then, is this light here? It is none other than
Jesus Christ the Savior. Who, then, are the formless and void, those
who have darkness on the face of the deep? They refer to none other
than ourselves. This describes us humans, who, though created by
God, were deceived by evil Satan and fell into confusion. From the
very beginning, God was promising the following: “When you fall
into confusion, I will save you with the light. And those who accept
the light will become light, but those who do not accept the light
will become darkness.”

When we make something, we have in advance a certain
purpose for making it. There is nothing that is made without a purpose.
When God created the heavens and the earth and made mankind in the
beginning, His plan was to raise us as His children, and to glorify
us in this position as His own children, not merely as simple creatures
any longer.

This is what the Bible is saying: In the beginning,
God created the heavens and the earth, and when He created us His
creatures, He did not make us as robots, but He gave free will to
all of us. God is saying to us, “Each of you can either accept or
reject My grace and blessings. I made you as creatures with the
freedom of choice.”

John 3:20-21 state, “For everyone practicing evil
hates the light and does not come to the light, lest his
deeds should be exposed. But he who does the truth comes to the
light, that his deeds may be clearly seen, that they have
been done in God.”

We the born-again can clearly distinguish the light
from darkness. However, the confused people who are still under
sin cannot discern the light from darkness. They generally hate
the light and love evil instead. Nonetheless, the right to choose
which of these two we would accept belongs entirely to us. Had God
not given us this right to choose-that is, had He not given us free
will-then we could not say that God is just.

On the other hand, had God left everyone all alone
to be cast into hell, then nor could we say that God is holy and
just. God is saying, “I am the Almighty, but I have given you free
will. So if you really love goodness, then follow this goodness
and receive all My blessings, and live in Me. But if you love darkness,
then feel free to do so.”

Therefore, those who have come into God’s light chose
God, acknowledged Him and believed in Him, and for this choice,
they will all receive the blessings of salvation from God and live
forever. Those who fail to do so, on the other hand, will deservedly
be cast into hell and made to suffer and gnash their teeth in pain,
for they chose their own wickedness. This is the righteous Truth
of God, and this is what reveals God’s divinity. It manifests that
God is completely perfect. God did not coerce us into anything,
but He manifested Himself through His covenant, and made us praise
Him justly.

By giving us His grace and Truth, God has made us
rule over all other creatures and be served by them. It is those
who choose before God what is right-the light, that is-whom God
blesses. But for those who choose evil, God judges their sins according
to His justice. This is who our God is as revealed n the Bible.

God is the God of covenant. No one can say that God
is unjust and unfair. God has given mankind the right to choose.
The Bible is saying that if anyone likes curses over blessings,
it has been set for whoever wants this to get it. In contrast, to
those who like the light and have accepted into their lives this
light, the Word of God, God will give all the blessings that He
promised. God has allowed whoever wants to blessed by Him, who created
the heaven and the earth, to choose His goodness and to receive
the blessings of salvation and eternal life.

God, who created the heavens and the earth, is speaking
to us. God is perfect. He alone is righteous, perfect, and is divine
for all creatures. He is the Creator. He is the Absolute Being.
There is no one who can object to this.

Through the Word, we saw the God of covenant who promised
us with the Word and fulfilled this Word of promise to us. God created
the heavens and the earth in the beginning. God actually made everything,
darkness and light alike. Do you acknowledge this? The right to
choose has been given to all human beings, and it is according to
their choice that the grace of God has been bestowed on them.

In the Kingdom of God, there is no such a word as
“no,” but only “yes.” In other words, there is only the infallible
Truth. That there is only “yes” means that there is nothing negative.

It is written, “The earth was without form, and
void; and darkness was on the face of the deep. And the Spirit of
God was hovering over the face of the waters. Then God said, ‘Let
there be light’; and there was light” (Genesis 1:2-3). When
the Bible says here that “God created the heavens and the earth,”
and follows on to say, “The earth was without form, and void,” it
implies that even before the foundation of the world, God’s plan
was already premised on the temptation of Satan.

If chapters 1 and 2 of the Book of Genesis are describing
God’s plan, then from chapter 3 and on, it is about the fulfillment
of this plan. We may say that God implemented His entire plan step
by step. Architects in this world change their construction plans
several times when building even just one building. However, God
has never changed His plan once He designed it. He executed everything
exactly according to how He planned. God did not just leave His
creatures merely as creatures, but He planned for them to be born
again through recreation. What set mankind free from sin was the
light. The Word of God was the resource that enabled people to escape
from sin.

If mankind were not formless and void, and there were
no darkness on the face of the deep-that is, if mankind were not
deceived by Satan-then human beings could not have put on the grace
that set them free from sin and become God’s children. It is by
believing in the gospel of the water and the Spirit that all of
us could put on the grace of salvation that Jesus Christ has given
to us and become God’s children. Our glory was already prepared
by the providence of God in His plan.

Adam and Eve, the common ancestors of mankind, were
deceived by Satan. However, even this was included in God’s predestination.
Maggots live for many years under the ground in the larval stage,
but they eventually climb up to a tree and are transformed through
metamorphosis to open their wings and become cicadas. To become
cicadas, they must all invariably live as maggots in the dark underground.
Like this, that we human beings were tempted by Satan and fell into
sin was also predestined in God’s glorious plan. In other Word,
God permitted us to be tempted by Satan because only if we had first
become sinners once could we be transformed into God’s children
by believing in Jesus Christ.

That people are formless and void, and darkness is
on the face of the deep, is a condition that has resulted from leaving
the light of God. When one departs from God, the Creator who made
him, and from His Word of covenant, his heart is visited by confusion
and void. Just as the first man Adam fell into confusion by departing
from the Word of God, among the descendants of Adam now, those who
have failed to meet Jesus Christ through the Word of covenant have
all fallen into confusion. Why have they fallen into confusion?
It is because they do not know the God-given gospel Word of the
water and the Spirit. This is why they cannot know God, who meets
us through the gospel Word of the water and the Spirit. Given this,
then, what must people do to escape from their confusion? If they
return to God’s Word of Truth, they can surely find God.

Moreover, everyone has fallen into a void because
of their sins. So people have no satisfaction. We human beings are
void unless we meet the God of Truth. Human beings were imperfect
when they were first created. God permitted this imperfection first
in order to make us perfect in His plan. Since it is the perfect
God who created us, unless we have Him inside us, we would remain
imperfect, have no true satisfaction, and fall into a void. Therefore,
because God fundamentally made us human beings in His image when
He created us, to find true satisfaction, everyone must be born
again without fail. In other words, in people’s hearts there must
be the gospel Truth of the water and the Spirit given by Jesus,
and only when we have the Holy Spirit inside us can we be made perfect.
One is truly satisfied only when he finds Jesus Christ.

All of us were deceived by Satan’s evil schemes, and
as a result, we all fell into confusion, void, and sin. God said
that He would save such people like us through His Son Jesus Christ.
From what did He promise to save us? He promised to save us from
confusion, void, and sin. He promised to save us from our sins,
from our profound emptiness, and from our unquenchable dissatisfaction.
This promise of salvation was already predestined in Jesus Christ.

Jesus Christ the Creator
Is the Savior of Those Who Believe in the Gospel of the Water and
the Spirit

The Lord of the universe is Jesus Christ. When it
is written in the Bible, “God said, ‘Let there be light’; and there
was light,” the light here is none other than Jesus Christ who has
saved you and me from our sins. Who created the universe and all
things in it with the Word? It is Jesus Christ Himself. It is this
very Jesus who created everything that our eyes see, from the heavens
to the earth, from the mountains to the seas, and from flowers to
all life forms.

“In the beginning God created the heavens and the
earth” (Genesis 1:1). The One who created this earth and these
heavens is Jesus, and what we must all realize is that God has blotted
out our sins by sending us this Son of His. Who else does the Bible
say Jesus is? It says that Jesus is the Son of God the Father. As
it is written, “I will declare the decree: The LORD has said
to Me, ‘You are My Son, Today I have begotten You’” (Psalms 2:7),
the Bible says that Jesus was begotten by the Father. However, the
Bible also says that the Son of God the Father is the same true
God as the Father (1 John 5:20).

That is why the Apostle John, who saw Jesus with his
own eyes and touched Him with his own hands, and who had lived with
Him for three years, declared, “In the beginning was the Word, and
the Word was with God, and the Word was God” (John 1:1). In other
words, Jesus is the very God who created the universe. God the Father
built the Kingdom of Heaven through His Son, and Jesus Christ created
the heavens and the earth that our eyes now see. All of us must
know this Jesus Christ accurately, that He is God Himself.

What else did God say? He said that He would save
us from all our sins through His sinless Son. God is the God of
Truth. When the Son of God the Father made this world, God said
that it was good to see the world that was illuminated by the Light.
And the Bible says, “That was the true Light which gives light
to every man coming into the world” (John 1:9).

This plan of God was all revealed by the Triune God,
that is, by God the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. The Bible
says, “The earth was without form, and void; and darkness was on
the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the
face of the waters.” Who is this Spirit that was hovering over the
face of the waters? The Spirit here is the Holy Spirit. The Son
of the Father is the One who made this universe, and God the Father
promised that through His Son He would save all these human beings
who have fallen into confusion and void.

And God sought to bestow on us the Spirit that makes
us God’s children, but this Spirit could not come into our hearts
as long as there was sin inside us. That is why God the Father made
a covenant with us His creatures and promised us to send His Son
to this earth. The “Spirit of God” here refers to the Holy Spirit,
and this Holy Spirit comes into those who believe in and follow
the promised Word of God and dwells in them. This is the very plan
of God. The Triune God is all manifested here. God had His complete
plan for us before the creation of the world, and He has been fulfilling
it step by step. We need to realize that this is why God said it
was good to see when He made the domain of the earth and the domain
of the heavens.

God said that when His Son created light on the first
day that He made this universe, it was good to see. In other words,
God was pleased to make His creatures His own children, the same
children as Jesus Christ. That is why the Apostle Paul, realizing
the majestic plans of God, praised, “Oh, the depth of the riches
both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are His
judgments and His ways past finding out!” (Romans 11:33)

It is also written, “Of Him and through Him and
to Him are all things” (Romans 11:36). How could then a mere
creature disobey its Creator? Disobedience itself is sin. God spoke
the Word of promise to us. And He is the God who separates His people
from the Devil’s people with His Word. If you accept the God-spoken
Word into your hearts, then you, too, will become God’s people.
Come into the light of Truth. You will then be able to become light
also.

God Said, “Let There Be
Light”

The Bible says that when God made mankind and the
universe, the earth was without form and void, and darkness was
on the face of the deep. This is how the Bible describes the condition
of those who have fallen into sin. The Bible also says that when
the earth-that is, the human heart-was without form, void, and in
the depth of sin, the Spirit of God was hovering on the face of
the waters. Put differently, it is in the hearts of the sinful that
God works, who created the universe and saves mankind from sin.

God speaks and has fellowship with those who come
out to Him through His Word, trusting in the Word. God approves
us when we believe in His Word. However, if we do not believe in
the Word of God, then our own thoughts will lead us to perish in
the end.

Why did Judas, who betrayed and sold out Jesus, hang
himself? He should have solved this sin by trusting in the Word
of God, but the Bible writes that instead of relying on the Word,
he repented all on his own and hung himself. Those whose hearts
have no faith in the Word of God end up condemning their sins themselves,
and therefore they cannot avoid but die forever. That Judas repented
on his own only means that he was convicted by his conscience, realizing
that he had made a profound mistake by betraying and selling out
his own teacher to certain death just for a handful of coins.

Judas’ deed was very wicked, but his even greater
spiritual mistake was the fact that he did not believe in Jesus
as the Son of God. We should reflect on what Jesus did when He came
to this earth based on the Word of both the New and Old Testaments,
and from this we must realize and believe that He is God Himself
and the Son of God. However, Judas did not believe in the divinity
of Jesus, and so instead of repenting, “I betrayed the real Son
of God. And I did not accept Him as my Savior,” he was merely convicted
by his own human conscience, guilt-ridden only to the extent that
he betrayed a man who had been his teacher, and ended up killing
himself.

We can stand before God only if we know our wrongdoings
based on the Word of God and repent from our sins by believing in
the gospel of the water and the Spirit; if, contrary to this, we
judge our deeds only according to our own standard, then we will
not only lose our life, but we will also enter into the everlasting
fire of hell.

When we do something wrong, we often tend to think
on our own, “Oh, so I made a mistake,” but our own standard of good
and evil is too ambiguous. Depending on our point of view, our deeds
can be assessed differently. Many times, what appears virtuous in
the eyes of the flesh is exposed to be very wicked from the spiritual
point of view. So when Judas repented before God, he only repented
in his conscience, not by believing in the Word of God. Clearly,
Jesus Christ was God Himself and the Savior of us mankind. The very
fact that Judas did not believe in this Savior was his greatest
mistake. Since Judas did not believe in Jesus as God, he was bound
to betray Him, and this was his wrongdoing, but Judas did not realize
this. In other words, Judas did not admit his wrongdoing based on
the Word of God. Instead, he only admitted his wrongdoing in his
conscience, and so simply thinking that he was bound to hell for
sure, he ended up killing himself. That is why Jesus lamented over
Judas, saying that it would have been better for him if he had never
been born (Mark 14:21).

All of us should realize that it is through His Word
that God speaks to us and works in our lives. And we must all realize
that through this Word of Truth, God has shone the light of salvation
on us, who had been confused, void, and in the depth of sin. As
God illuminates us with His light, it is through this light of Truth
that we can finally realize how our hearts are empty and confused,
and how we are in the depth of sin. That is because God has shone
the light of salvation on all of us. Had God not shone this light,
it would have been impossible for us to realize anything at all,
not knowing that we were confused, nor grasping that we were void
and in darkness.

To such people like us, God has illuminated the light
of salvation, and He has separated the light from the darkness.
We must know about this light. It is simply indispensable for us
to receive the remission of our sins and to follow the light. When
we are working on something, depending on whether we look at it
from the viewpoint of the Word of God or just based on our own carnal
thought, the same thing can be seen very differently. Even when
we look at the same object, what we see through the Word of God,
the light, and just through our own eyes of the flesh can be completely
different.

So it is extremely important to follow the light.
Our hearts and thoughts must cherish this light and love it, and
we should always live according to this light and see everything
from its point of view. This is indispensable, and we must all live
according to the light in this way.

In the Gospel of John, Jesus said, “I am the light
of the world. He who follows Me shall not walk in darkness, but
have the light of life” (John 8:12). There is no darkness whatsoever
in God, and there only exists the light. By accepting the God-given
light of salvation, we have become righteous people. Whether we
are actually saved or not, and whether we remain as sinners or become
righteous, all depend entirely on whether or not we have this light
of Truth.

So our salvation requires us to have this light, but
what about afterwards? How should we live after being saved? We
must follow the light of Truth. When you are spreading the gospel,
you are just illuminating others with the God-given light of Truth,
just as it is written, “Then God said, ‘Let there be light’;
and there was light.” You are following the light and shinning
the light. We are not the maker of this light, but all that we do
is just accept this light into our hearts and illuminate it to others.
That’s because preaching this gospel is to shine the light. For
us to preach the gospel of the water and the Spirit is to spread
the light itself. Souls will then hear the Word of light preached
by us and be transformed.

If we do not shine the light to those who are still
in darkness, then everything is useless, no matter how well we might
have taught them and how well we might have plowed the fields of
their hearts. All our efforts turn out to be useless. To shine the
true light is what all of us must do as Jesus’ witnesses and saints.
Our lives will become brighter if only we make up our minds, saying,
“Our lives of faith are one that follows the light. We follow the
light, the light of God. To bear witness is to shine the light.
I shine the light. There are many things in this world, but in God,
there is no darkness, only the light.”

We have this light with us. There exist both light
and darkness in this world, but it is the light that we follow.
As God said, “Let there be light,” He gave us the light of Truth.
When we are preaching the gospel, we are shining this light, and
when we carry on with our everyday life, we are also following this
light.

Through the gospel of the water and the Spirit that
God has given us-that is, through the Truth of God-we have been
saved, and we have become light. Now, we believe that we are light,
we preach the light, and we live our lives following this light.
We want to live the kind of life that is lived according to the
light, and that spreads this light, not the things of the flesh
on this earth. It is for this purpose that God has called us. What
we must never forget in our lives is to follow this light. But this
does not mean that we are to live in carnal perfection.

The light is Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ alone is the
light, and He has illuminated our hearts with this light. And we
have accepted this light. So we have become day. That we have become
light does not mean that we can live perfectly in the flesh. Rather,
it means that we have received the remission of sin in the providence
of the grace of God. All of us must know clearly what is the light.

As we carry on with our lives, we often forget about
the gospel light too easily. The gospel of the water and the Spirit
is the light, but we actually end up forgetting this. Once we find
something we lost, we are prone to soon forget about the person
who found it for us and returned it to us. Like this, our minds
end up forgetting about the light itself. This is a serious problem.

We have the light. This light is Jesus Christ. This
light is also the gospel of the water and the Spirit. When there
is light, people’s basic instinct is to follow the light. They want
to serve the light. It is good for our hearts to have the light,
and it is good for our minds to remember that God is the light.
To preach the gospel is to spread the light. It is not when we make
something on our own, but when we preach the gospel received from
the Lord, that we are spreading the light. We may do many different
things, but all these things are actually done to spread the light.
It is to follow the light that we are living our lives of faith,
and it is in this light that we do everything and live all our lives.

In the First Epistle of John, God speaks about the
light frequently. It is written, “He who says he is in the light,
and hates his brother, is in darkness until now. He who loves his
brother abides in the light, and there is no cause for stumbling
in him. But he who hates his brother is in darkness and walks in
darkness, and does not know where he is going, because the darkness
has blinded his eyes” (1 John 2:9-11).

We are living by the grace of God. To preach the gospel
and to do God’s work are indeed to live the life that spreads the
light. Instead of thinking about this life too complicatedly, you
should just realize simply, clearly, and correctly that to believe
in Jesus Christ and preach His gospel Truth of salvation is to live
the life that spreads the light. All that you have to do is just
keep in mind that to believe in and preach Jesus Christ as the light
is what the life of light is all about.

Unless you keep this in mind, you can hardly realize
what you are living for. The reason why I am saying this is because
those who have received the remission of their sins just recently
have too many things on their mind. When they are told to become
God’s servants and work, they get all overwhelmed by all kinds of
hesitation. Why is this the case? It’s because they have forgotten
about the Word of God. Even the very fact that we have been saved
through the gospel of the water and the Spirit is something that
has already been attained, and so it is quite possible for us to
forget about its preciousness.

That is why we must regularly affirm the fact that
we have become light. We need to once again ruminate on the Word,
reflecting, “God is the light. God commanded there to be light.
As God said so, there was light. And God separated the light from
the darkness. He called the light day, and the darkness night. God
shone the light on the earth that was formless, void, and in the
depth of darkness. As God shed His light on this earth, I came to
be born again, and to realize my confusion, my void, and the depth
of my darkness.”

Whether a soul becomes righteous or remains sinful
is a simple result that is determined by the light of God. When
God illuminates us with the light of salvation-that is, the gospel
of the water and the Spirit-those who accept this light of salvation
are to become righteous people, and those who do not accept this
light into their hearts are to remain as sinners. When the sun comes
up in the morning, its light illuminates the whole world. No one
can escape and hide from its warmth (Psalm 19:6). In other words,
no place is too far away from the true light to receive it. Everything
is illuminated, and everything reflects back this light and shines
also.

Just as the moon shines by reflecting the light from
the sun, we who have become holy by believing in the gospel of the
water and the Spirit also look toward the light and reflect this
light everyday. While Jesus said, “I am the light of the world,”
we ourselves cannot say that we are the light of the world. There
is nothing in our flesh to love or be proud of, and we really are
nobody. It is simply impossible to shine the light with our own
flesh. As the Bible says, “To be carnally minded is death, but
to be spiritually minded is life and peace” (Romans 8:6), in
our everyday life, the light and the darkness still coexist.

When those of us who have received the remission of
our sins know that we have the light, and when we focus on this
light and march forth following this light, we can always live an
upright life. It is such a joy to think about this, that we truly
have the light. Whenever our hearts are darkened, and whenever we
get confused and don’t know what to do, we can decide what is right
in no time if we just look at the light. It is by the light that
we can discern what we should do and how we should live. Because
we are only too human, we often fall into confusion, we often feel
empty, and darkness is often on the face of the deep. Even so, however,
we can still continue to follow the light in times like these also,
for we have the light.

I am so thankful that we have the light, that this
light is in our hearts, and that this light is in the whole universe.
I am truly grateful for the fact that God has given us the light.
No matter what circumstances we might face, and no matter what insufficiencies
might be revealed in us, because we have the light, we can still
follow it. Words cannot express how thankful I am for this. If this
light were not there, only hopelessness would await us.

There is a huge difference between someone who has
the light and someone who does not. Those who have the light may
be darkened for a short while, but because they have the light,
they can get hold of the rudder once again, follow the guidance
of the light, set the direction for their lives, and go forth following
the light.

In contrast, it is fundamentally impossible for those
who have no light, those who have not accepted this light, to live
the life of light no matter how much they might desire this. This
makes a huge difference. In terms of the flesh itself, there is
little difference between those who have accepted the light and
those who have not. Viewed in carnal terms, nor are their thoughts
so different from each other. Any difference between the two is
only paper-thin, and there really is no big difference to speak
of. When someone who is not born again goes to the washroom, I go
to the washroom also, and when he eats, I eat too.

The only difference is whether one has accepted Jesus
by faith or not; apart from this, there is no other difference.
This may seem like a small difference, but it is actually a huge
difference. Because we have Jesus Christ, we live in His grace,
and because we believe in Jesus Christ, we really can do God’s work
at all times.

Those who have been born again through the gospel
of the water and the Spirit may be completely insufficient, but
they can still look toward the light and follow it always; in contrast,
those who have not accepted the light cannot live virtuously, no
matter how much they might desire this. I see this happening all
too often around me. Even the so-called servants of God actually
have no light in them, and so they are incapable of teaching anything.
Many of them cannot even teach the congregation when the rapture
would come, whether it would be before, after, or in the middle
of the great tribulation, precisely because they themselves do not
know this.

If they know that Jesus Christ is the light and have
accepted this light, why are they still in darkness? Why are they
still dark? When the gospel and the light are there, how can they
not know this? The Lord clearly said that He will come back when
the trumpet is blown at the end, but when will this last trumpet
sound? Is it before the great tribulation? Absolutely not! Then
is it after the great tribulation? No way! Neither view is correct,
for our Lord said that the rapture will come after the great tribulation
begins but before it ends, before the wrath of the seven bowls are
poured, and many saints will be martyred at that time. All that
we have to do is just believe accordingly. Would someone who really
has the light fail to discern this?

Nowadays, it seems as if the churches in Korea are
competing against each other to build a bigger church building.
Five of the ten largest churches in the world are said to be located
in Korea. Some pastors of these churches make their congregation
donate construction funds by taking out loans and mortgaging their
houses. Would such a conduct be appropriate to the kind of life
that is led by those who have received the light? I bet that they
are not the receivers of the true light.

Those who have accepted the light walk in grace. As
God has saved us, it is in His grace that we preach the gospel of
the water and the Spirit given by God, and it is according to how
much God has empowered us that we do everything. That is why the
Apostle Paul confessed, “I can do all things through Christ who
strengthens me” (Philippians 4:13).

Some people say that they are studying the Bible in
their homes on their own to minister as a pastor later on. But to
minister as a pastor, one must first learn about the gospel of the
water and the Spirit and believe in it. He must first accept the
light. And only when he himself becomes light can he shine the light
on others sitting in darkness.

By believing in the gospel of the water and the Spirit,
we have come to dwell in God’s grace. It is because we have accepted
the gift of salvation through God’s gospel of the water and the
Spirit that we are shinning the light that God has illuminated us.
In the Lord, I reflect quietly on what kind of grace God has given
us. God has entrusted us with His work, and we do this work by faith,
within the bounds of the strength that He gives us. Since we follow
the Lord by believing so, we are always at peace.

If someone does not accept his salvation, then nor
can we impose it on him by force. Are we God? No, of course not;
we only believe that God is the light and follow this light. Whenever
our hearts are about to fall into weaknesses and darkness, we have
to look toward the light once again and follow this light as we
are illuminated by it.

When you go out and bear witness, don’t make this
any more difficult than it really is. What we are spreading is only
the gospel of the water and the Spirit. We are not spreading our
own eloquence, our own gift, or our own wisdom. We are not boasting
of anything else, but we are spreading only the gospel of the water
and the Spirit that Jesus Christ has completed. And we are living
according to the light. Whether we do something well or not is not
what is important, but what is important is to live for the Lord
and follow Him.

We have already accepted the light, and we have already
become the ones who are spreading this light. There must be such
a belief in our hearts. This faith itself enables us to always spread
the gospel, do the work of righteousness, look toward the light,
and live according to the light. We can then live upright at all
times and never stumble.

Above all else, I give my thanks to God for giving
us the light of salvation. Even if we have nothing else but only
the light of salvation, we can still live our lives in the Lord
always. Because there is nothing good in us, we need the light,
and all that we have to do is just believe in this light of salvation
and live our lives in this grace, spreading the true gospel to everyone.
As we believe in the light of salvation, it has now been made possible
for us to always live the life of light before God.